Taking Stock of the Effectiveness of a Meta-Assessment Process

Auburn University engaged in the reaffirmation process with SACSCOC (institutional accreditor) and received recommendations surrounding assessment practices. It was from these recommendations that the Office of Academic Assessment (OAA) was created in July 2015, providing dedicated assessment support to faculty responsible for educational programs. After 2015, the OAA began to implement a meta-assessment approach to program assessment of student learning. The meta-assessment process. The purpose of meta-assessment is to evaluate and provide diagnostic feedback to academic degree programs on their annual assessment plans. The process of meta-assessment at Auburn involves an intake of reports from over 400 academic programs with a team of trained faculty raters reading and evaluating the submitted reports. This article examines the meta-assessment process at the university.